June 2013

Mississippi’s young people, including those with developmental and intellectual disabilities, should be afforded the opportunity for competitive, meaningful employment and productive lives as citizens of this state. To that end, the Mississippi Partnerships for Employment project will hold regional awareness sessions across the state to provide information on Employment First.

The University of Southern Mississippi’s College of Health hosted the 3rd Annual Mississippi Health Summit on June 26 at the Thad Cochran Center on the Hattiesburg campus. Approximately 180 healthcare professionals attended sessions to discuss issues and exchange ideas.

Caleb Faulkner, an incoming freshman chemistry and biochemistry major at The University of Southern Mississippi, has been awarded a $5,000 scholarship from the American Chemical Society (ACS) Project SEED program. This is the first SEED scholarship awarded to a Southern Miss student.

Dr. Heidi Lyn, assistant professor of psychology at The University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Coast, co-authored a paper recently published by the journal Frontiers in Psychology showing the comparison of communication by baby apes and humans, which implicates the theory of how language evolved in humans.

Hannah Roberts, a University of Southern Mississippi sophomore from Mount Olive, Miss. performs on the violin Tuesday, June 25 during her trunk show in advance of her competition in the Miss Mississippi Pageant, set for July 10-13 in Vicksburg. Roberts, a Goldwater Scholar and student in the university's prestigious Honors College, qualified to compete in the event by winning the Miss University of Southern Mississippi Pageant in October 2012. (Southern Miss photo by Kelly Dunn)

Minority businesses will have a unique opportunity to access one-on-one networking when The University of Southern Mississippi sponsors a Minority Business Expo on Tuesday, July 9 at the Thad Cochran Center.

The Southern Quintet, composed of students from The University of Southern Mississippi School of Music, has been accepted to attend the Imani Winds Chamber Music Festival. The event will be held at The Julliard School in New York City July 28 - August 8.

Dr. Louis Kyriakoudes, associate professor of history and director of the Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage at The University of Southern Mississippi, recently presented at the 8th World Conference of Science Journalists. The conference is being held June 24-28 in Helsinki, Finland.

Celebrating a legacy of social work was the focus of the Third Annual Betty Spencer Memorial Social Work Luncheon where The University of Southern Mississippi School of Social Work was presented a $5,000 gift to increase the total endowment of the Betty Spencer Memorial Scholarship which has a corpus of more than $20,000.